Housings and enclosures are often created for the purpose of protecting their contents from elements such as water, particulates, or other environmental contaminants. Such housings and enclosures may require addition of a seal, such as a gasket or O-ring, that is interposed between two opposing surfaces of the housing or enclosure to block any gaps between those surfaces against the intrusion of environmental contaminants.
Adding seals to housings (e.g. a housing for electronic device components) and enclosures (e.g. an enclosure configured to encase an electronic device housing) is accomplished using tooling methods that add time, expense, and complexity to manufacturing of a housing or enclosure. In one method, a seal may be added to an enclosure part by overmolding or insert-molding an elastomer directly onto a base material, such as a rigid or semi-rigid plastic resin. Such techniques require creation of a separate tool for the overmold that must conform to the enclosure part receiving the sealing material. In another method, a seal is fabricated separately and placed or adhered to a sealing seat where the seal is needed. As with overmolded seals, using separately molded seals requires creation of an individual tool for the seals in addition to the encasement part itself. In addition, enclosure seals that are fabricated separately can create problems for a user that repeatedly opens and closes the enclosure, as the seal can fall out and become damaged or lost.
While seals can be manufactured for enclosures and housings using tooling techniques, the separate tools required by these methods are costly and time-consuming to create. Each sealing tool must be shaped to the part and adjusted to create an appropriate seal for a given enclosure part. In addition, if a manufacturer modifies the geometry of the part during production, the manufacturer must also make a new tool for the seal, expending additional time and expense. Moreover, if the manufacturer wants to increase the output of parts, additional identical tools must be generated, further increasing the time and expense of production.
Thus, it is desirable to have the ability to add a seal to enclosures and housings, while being able to quickly and easily adapt the seal geometry to modifications made in the sealing surface geometry of the housing or enclosure without the expense or inconveniences of building additional tooling.